By Michael Letendre  

The Central Connecticut Conference’s football line-up is an impressive front, representing 31 programs over four balanced tiers.  

And there’s been some excellent football played by the CCC squads over the years.  

The CCC was well represented in the state tournament last season as three of the eight class finalists, including Class L champion Maloney, who had to defeat Bristol Central and Windsor along the way, were from the Central Connecticut area.  

In Class LL play, No. 4 Hall and No. 7 Southington represented the CCC in the largest bracket while in Class M, Avon was the league’s lone representative.  

And over in the smallest division, in Class S, Bloomfield made it all the way to the finals before falling to the Cromwell/Portland program in the state title tilt.  

That’s over a half-dozen squads that made the playoffs from the CCC and with the CIAC expanding scholastic football into six divisions (LL, L, M, and S along with MM and SS), the chance for more teams from the Central Connecticut area competing in the playoffs has greatly increased.  

In terms of regular season play, the CCC divisions are broken up into groups by class size.  

The intent of the four tiers is to keep the bigger schools away from the smaller ones and overall, the method has worked out much better over just a straight CCC scheduling between divisions.  

Back in the day, the likes of powerful – and bigger – New Britain competing against smaller programs like Meriden and Platt which didn’t make a whole lot of sense.  

The current mix is a good one and plenty of crossover games are still played between the tiers.  

A giant like Southington paired off against like sized squads in Tier I, staying away from smaller teams such as Plainville and Lewis Mills in Tier III and IV, respectively, keeps things balanced and as equal as possible.  

There was a little movement between the tiers this season as Newington moved up from Tier II to Tier I while New Britain flipped down from I to II.  

The Golden Hurricanes went 1-9 last season while Newington fared much better at 7-3.  

On a local level, Bristol Central (9-1) moved up from Tier III to Tier II, as did South Windsor (7-3) while Berlin (4-6) moved down to Tier III.  

Due to that change for Central, the squad will only be playing three opponents from last season with South Windsor, Wethersfield, and Bristol Eastern remaining on the docket from 2021.  

Manchester (1-9) now competes in Tier III and Avon (7-2) moved up there as well.  

And after a 1-9 campaign, Edwin O. Smith dropped down to Tier IV from the ranks of Tier III.  

Here is the line-up of the four tiers in CCC Football in 2022, including last season’s regular season record:  

Tier I – Conard (4-6), East Hartford (5-5), Glastonbury (2-8), Hall (9-1), Maloney (9-1), Newington (was Tier II last season, 7-3), Simsbury (5-5), Southington (8-2).  

Tier II – Bristol Central (9-1), Enfield (0-10), Middletown (4-6), New Britain (1-9), Platt (5-5), South Windsor (7-3), Wethersfield (6-4), Windsor (9-1).  

Tier III – Avon (7-2), Berlin (4-6), Bloomfield (10-0), Bristol Eastern (4-6), Farmington (0-10), Manchester (1-9), Plainville (7-3), RHAM (5-5).  

Tier IV – East Catholic (3-7), Edwin O. Smith (1-9), Hartford Public (2-7), Lewis Mills (4-6), Northwest Catholic (2-7), Rocky Hill (5-4), Tolland (6-4).

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